main.c

the main project file

Pro tip: Never put everything in the main.c or the main() funtion itself! Code always need to be clean and well structured

After structuring the whole project, including all required libraries and defining all used functions and structs, now we must keep only the important things in the main.c

Our main.c only contains the most important things

main.c head:

In the head file we include all the required headers, libraries and macros to use 'em in our project:

#include "headers/includes.h" //? The file wchich includes all required libraries to work.
#include "headers/functions.h" //? Local library contains many functions for this project.

#define NUMBUTTONS 6

main.c body:

in a well-strucured C project, the main.c body must only contains the main() function which itself only contains other functions calls, exactly like our code

Our main() function can be parted into 4 parts:

int main() {
    
    // Part 1: Windows and buttons

    // Part 2: Keys Listener

    // Part 3: Preforming Actions

    // Part 4: Cleaning Up
}

Part 1: Defining Windows and Buttons for our UI

//PART 1: Windows and Buttons
    setlocale(LC_ALL, ""); //? Support Non-Ascii characters for most Unix-Like terminals (source: includes.h => locale.h)

    //* Initialize ncurses screen (Source: includes.h => ncurses.h)
    initscr(); 
    cbreak();
    keypad(stdscr, TRUE);
    curs_set(0);

    //* Initialize color pairs
    start_color();
    init_pair(1, COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_WHITE);
    init_pair(2, COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_GREEN);

    //* Create welcome window
    int max_y, max_x;
    getmaxyx(stdscr, max_y, max_x);
    WINDOW* welcome_win = newwin(max_y, max_x, 0, 0);
    box(welcome_win, 0, 0);
    refresh();

    //* Print welcome message and description
    const char* title = " Welcome to Etudiants Management Program ";
    const char* btn = "Press Enter to Continue";
    int title_len = strlen(title);
    int btn_len = strlen(btn);
    
    //? Print an ASCII Art as a logo
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 - 6, max_x/2 - 45,  "███████╗████████╗██╗   ██╗ ███╗   ███╗ █████╗ ███╗  ██╗ █████╗  ██████╗ ███████╗██████╗ \n");
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 - 5, max_x/2 - 45,  "██╔════╝╚══██╔══╝██║   ██║ ████╗ ████║██╔══██╗████╗ ██║██╔══██╗██╔════╝ ██╔════╝██╔══██╗\n");
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 - 4, max_x/2 - 45,  "█████╗     ██║   ██║   ██║ ██╔████╔██║███████║██╔██╗██║███████║██║  ██╗ █████╗  ██████╔╝\n");
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 - 3, max_x/2 - 45,  "██╔══╝     ██║   ██║   ██║ ██║╚██╔╝██║██╔══██║██║╚████║██╔══██║██║  ╚██╗██╔══╝  ██╔══██╗\n");
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 - 2, max_x/2 - 45,  "███████╗   ██║   ╚██████╔╝ ██║ ╚═╝ ██║██║  ██║██║ ╚███║██║  ██║╚██████╔╝███████╗██║  ██║\n");
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 - 1, max_x/2 - 45,  "╚══════╝   ╚═╝    ╚═════╝  ╚═╝     ╚═╝╚═╝  ╚═╝╚═╝  ╚══╝╚═╝  ╚═╝ ╚═════╝ ╚══════╝╚═╝  ╚═╝\n");
    //? Pint the Title with bold and reversed format
    wattron(welcome_win, A_BOLD | A_REVERSE); //turns on bold and reverse fromat
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 + 3, max_x/2 - title_len/2, "%s", title);
    wattroff(welcome_win, A_BOLD | A_REVERSE); //turns off bold and reverse fromat
    //? Pint the Description with bold and blink effect
    wattron(welcome_win, A_BOLD | A_BLINK); //turn on bold and blink effect
    mvwprintw(welcome_win, max_y/2 + 5, max_x/2 - btn_len/2, "%s", btn);
    wattroff(welcome_win, A_BOLD | A_BLINK); //turn on bold and blink effect

    //* Refresh welcome screen
    wrefresh(welcome_win);

    //! A key listener: Wait for user to click Enter to continue
    int ch = getch();
    while (ch != '\n') {
        ch = getch();
    }

    //* Delete welcome screen
    delwin(welcome_win);

MAIN:
    //* Create main window
    getmaxyx(stdscr, max_y, max_x);
    WINDOW* mainwin = newwin(max_y, max_x, 0, 0);
    box(mainwin, 0, 0);
    refresh();

    //* Create buttons
    const char *ttl = "Students Management:";
    int ttl_len = strlen(ttl);
    char *button_labels[6] = {
        "Add Students",
        "Display Students",
        "Search Students",
        "Modify Students",
        "Delete Students",
        "Average Calculator"
    };
    int current_button = 0;

    wattron(mainwin, A_BOLD);
    mvwprintw(mainwin, max_y/2 -11, max_x/2 - ttl_len/2, "%s", ttl);
    wattroff(mainwin, A_BOLD);
    
    mvprintw(LINES-2, 2, "Press Q key to exit...");

    WINDOW* button_wins[NUMBUTTONS];
    for (int i = 0; i < NUMBUTTONS; i++) {
        button_wins[i] = subwin(mainwin, 3, 20, max_y/2 + i*3 - NUMBUTTONS*3/2, max_x/2 - 10);
        wbkgd(button_wins[i], COLOR_PAIR(1));
        box(button_wins[i], 0, 0);
        mvwprintw(button_wins[i], 1, 1, button_labels[i]);
    }
    wbkgd(button_wins[current_button], COLOR_PAIR(2));
    wrefresh(mainwin);
...

Part 2: Keys Listener

setting up a keys listener to record keyboard clicks, we actually have only 3 cases: Key Up, Key Down: to browse through the options. Enter Key: to confirm/access to an option. Q key: to quite the program.

//Part 2: Keys Listener
    
    // Main loop
    bool quit = false;
    while (!quit) {
        int ch = getch();
        switch (ch) {
            case KEY_DOWN: // case key down clicked
                /*
                    Here we switch the colors pairs from white to green to make button appears like it's active (the selected one)
                    So used can knows which button possition he's on
                */
                wbkgd(button_wins[current_button], COLOR_PAIR(1));
                wrefresh(button_wins[current_button]);
                current_button = (current_button + 1) % NUMBUTTONS;
                wbkgd(button_wins[current_button], COLOR_PAIR(2));
                wrefresh(button_wins[current_button]);
                break;
            case KEY_UP: // case of key up clicked
                wbkgd(button_wins[current_button], COLOR_PAIR(1));
                wrefresh(button_wins[current_button]);
                current_button = (current_button - 1 + NUMBUTTONS) % NUMBUTTONS;
                wbkgd(button_wins[current_button], COLOR_PAIR(2));
                wrefresh(button_wins[current_button]);
                break;
            case '\n': // case of Enter clicked

                //Part 3: Preforming Actions   

                break;
            case 'q': // case of lowercase q
            case 'Q': // case of uppercase Q
                quit = true; // break the loop and exit program
                break;
            
        }
    }

Part 3: Preforming actions

Here we give each button it's function using if else cases and button index variable we called "current_button":

//Part 3: Preforming Actions   

if (current_button == 0) {
      addStudent();
   } else if (current_button == 1) {
      display_students();
   } else if (current_button == 2) {
      searchStudent();
   } else if (current_button == 3) {
      update_student();
   } else if (current_button == 4) {
      delete_student();
   } else if (current_button == 5) {
      calculateAverage();
   }
// Cleaning up after finishing the function job
mvprintw(LINES-2, 2, "Press any key to continue...");
getch(); //* Wait for user input
clear(); //! Clear the screen
box(mainwin, 0, 0); //* Redraw main window border
wrefresh(mainwin); //* Refresh main window
goto MAIN; //* Go back to main loop